Systems for controlling environmental conditions, for example in buildings, are becoming increasingly sophisticated. A control system may at once control heating and cooling, monitor air quality, detect hazardous conditions such as fire, carbon monoxide release, intrusion, and the like. Such control systems generally include at least one environment controller, which receives measured environmental values, generally from external sensors, and in turn determines set-points or command parameters to be sent to controlled appliances.
Communications between an environment controller and the devices under its control (sensors, controlled appliances, etc.) were traditionally based on wires. The wires are deployed in the building where the environment control system is operating, for instance in the walls, ceilings, and floors of multiple rooms in the building. Deploying wires in a building is usually disrupting for the daily operations in the building and costly. Thus, recently deployed environment controllers and devices under their control (sensors, controlled appliances, etc.) are using the Wi-Fi communication protocol to exchange environmental data.
The environment controller and the devices under its control (sensors, controlled appliances, etc.) are generally referred to as Environment Control Devices (ECDs). A technician installing an environment control system comprising a plurality of ECDS may configure one of the ECDs (e.g. an environment controller) to support either a Wi-Fi Access Point functionality or a Wi-Fi hotspot functionality. The choice between the two functionalities depends on whether the ECD can connect (Access Point mode) or not (hotspot mode) to an existing IP network of the building. A manual configuration of the ECD (either in Access Point or hotspot mode) performed by the technician takes time and is prone to error. Automating this configuration could facilitate the task of the technician and avoid configuration errors.
Therefore, there is a need for a new environment control device (ECD) and method for configuring the ECD to operate a Wi-Fi communication interface.